True Conversion To Know You Are Truly Saved: Examining The Sinner’s Prayer

True Conversion To Know You Are Truly Saved: Examining The Sinner’s Prayer

        A Christian’s salvation is secure forever. To know he is truly saved he must simply believe that what Scripture says about salvation is true, and accept it and live by it. There is no magic formula one has to do to be saved. It is simply to have the correct mindset and spiritual transformation by God. Even if there is no magic formula, sometimes a formula has aided someone’s understanding of true biblical salvation such as the formula presented in the sinner’s prayer. I do not use the sinner’s prayer personally and I will explain later, but first I will examine the sinner’s prayer with you.

        Although current popular, reformed, evangelical leaders such as David Platt, who was mentioned in an earlier post about his hate for the sinner’s prayer, will say it is evil and that it leads people to false conversion, that is not always the case. I personally do not use the sinner’s prayer or lead anyone through it when I witness the Gospel. I do not think it is necessary but when writing a Gospel tract or explaining it through typing I have on occasion went through the basic ideas found in a typical sinner’s prayer writing. This is because, although the sinner’s prayer is a formula and could be impersonally recited, it still contains the basic ideas or knowledge of what brings someone to salvation.

        The sinner’s prayer contains basic belief statements written in so many words, and there are many versions, but they all should state these general concepts in a form such as this:

“Dear God, I am a sinner and I know I deserve to be punished. But I believe that your Son Jesus Christ came down to die for my sins and has taken my punishment for me. I am sorry for my sins and want to be forgiven. Please enter my heart and live in me and become my Lord and Savior. Help me to live for you. I put my faith and trust in you. Thank you. Amen.“

 This in itself is not bad. It states correct doctrine of understanding about what God has done and how to pray to God and repent. It promotes, repentance, faith, trust, beliefs in God. It expresses that Christ took the punishment for us and that we must make God our Lord and Savior, etc. A Christian can find all of these concepts in the Bible in verses that express these things.

        Some people who hold to reformed theology or Calvinism assume the sinner’s prayer is Arminian and is a manipulative trick to get someone to recite a prayer like some kind of incantation that supernaturally seals a person’s soul for salvation. I am a Calvinist but I do not believe such things. I do not believe the sinner’s prayer is necessarily an Arminian trick. John Bunyan who wrote Pilgrim’s Progress promoted in that story reformed beliefs about salvation. That God comes to you first and chooses you and you repent. He also expresses that some people are hardened and unable now to repent, such as the “man in the iron cage” in the story. Even Bunyan expresses his own version of the sinners prayer in his book. This is not anti-reformed theology. Ben Roger’s in Founder’s Journal states, “For John Bunyan, Christ’s whole obedience, both active and passive, was performed for the elect and the elect alone.”

        The sinner’s prayer has history in Christianity. Maybe it’s not found in the Bible but it has often been to used as a way to express the points one must understand for salvation. The idea of confessing with the mouth the Lord Jesus as found in Romans 10:9 is what prompted it in the first place. Even so, one must make sure they do not use the sinner’s prayer as a magic incantation or magic spell one must recite in order to magically seal themselves into salvation. Words mean nothing, but the heart’s intention mean everything. The words expressed from the heart are what matters. A true Christian will understand who Christ is, what He did on the cross, that what Christ did was take the punishment the Christian deserved himself  but Christ suffered in his place, that Christ rose from the dead and is alive, that the Holy Spirit now lives in him, that he is now the slave and and servant of God as he has made God through Christ his Lord and Master, and that he is now forgiven and should expect to see God in glory in heaven with the other saints. This Christian will live a holy life with intention to love God and obey Him. When this Christian sins he will understand no matter what God has saved him and he will fall on his knees in a heart of repentance as he looks at the cross and not his own will to be secure (1 John 1:9). He will always desire what is good even if he sins because he will get back on track. John MacArthur in his book Twelve Unlikely Heroes states,

“[God’s] saving grace extends to all who repent and believe in Him…When sinner’s recognize the Lord as Sovereign Creator and Judge of the Universe, and cry out to Him for mercy, He graciously saves them from divine wrath, giving them eternal life instead…Sinner’s are creatures who have broken God’s law. They await His wrath, yet He offers them forgiveness and salvation through the sacrifice of His Son, Jesus Christ…those who repent from their sin and believe in Him, whether Jew of Gentile, will be saved (Romans 10:9-10).” (pp. 125-126)

The above quote is all of the doctrine found in a typical sinner’s prayer. The key to making it valid is if the wrods come from the heart of the sinner. That the sinner cries out to God out of sincerity and fear and awe.

        Some reformed types who are more hyper would have problems with such statements about the sinner’s prayer. But in reality Christians sin, but they do not have a continual willful rebellion against God and unconcerned feelings towards their personal sins and offenses against the Lord. This is not antinomianism. The idea of eternal security is often portrayed by false teachers as a person who says the Lord’s prayer and confesses Christ at some point in his life and no matter what will be saved just because he recited it. Now, no matter how this person lives or what he cares about does not matter because he is saved and nothing can take his salvation away. Not only do false teachers teach such heresy, there are many genuine Christians who misunderstand what eternal security means. The truth is eternal security is what Calvinists term as Election, but still many Calvinists also misunderstand Eternal Security and think it means what the false teaching stated above is. Eternal Security is not Arminian, it actually is the same idea that high brow Calvinists term as predestination or election. Not that the terms predestination or election are wrong terms. They are the correct terms and found in the Bible, but the idea that you must only use such terms when describing eternal salvation that cannot be taken away. Such high brow egghead types will claim the term Eternal Security is unbiblical, yet it is really just another way to describe these biblical teachings. Nothing can be taken out of Christ’s hands and what the Father has given Him no one can ever take away (John 20:28).

        Here is a good video that explains certain phrases and how they are unbiblical with how typically evangelicals present the sinner’s prayer.

Todd Freel does not completely bash the sinner’s prayer, or claim people who say such phrases did something completely evil, he just believes one should present the Gospel as biblically as possible. I agree.

        I personally do not use the sinner’s prayer when doing evangelism simply because I do not want someone to mistakenly assume that reciting it alone will save them. A heart change is necessary and one cannot tell a person’s fruits right away, one must be sanctified through discipleship and biblical understanding. The proof of their salvation will be shown through the way they live much as how the second chapter of James explains. Yet, this does not invalidate some Christians who came to know the Lord because of the sinner’ prayer or even an altar call. God has used such things in the past to save his elect. It is not inherently evil nor is it damnable. But I do not think it is the best way to promote the Gospel. Even though I do not use the sinner’s prayer, I explain everything that is found within it from the Bible and my own words to describe what one must do to be saved. There is a serious overreaction against the sinner’s prayer by popular evangelical leaders today that I find ridiculous. It is a huge trend to bash on traditional church or evangelical behaviors. I do understand the problem of emotional manipulation and other nonsense, but the sinner’s prayer in itself is not completely wrong. I do thin though, there are more effective and sure ways to promote salvation than the sinner’s prayer. But it certainly is not damnable more than someone who confesses reformed theology but is truly a heretic who many people today are following (another topic for another time).

Islamic State Slaughtering Christian Children House To House

Islamic State Slaughtering Christian Children House To House

        There has been a report that ISIS is slaughtering Christian children house to house in front of their Christian parents. They are asking them to deny Christ and the children all refuse and are then shot. There have been missionaries in these areas for some time before the spread of ISIS so there have been converts in such Muslim areas. Now that ISIS took over they are trying to stomp out anyone who does not conform to their style of Islam. The missionaries are standing firm in the face of this atrocity and standing for Jesus Christ. They need your prayers. Of course even non-Christians groups who are not Sunni-Islam and are moderate Muslims or pagan religions, also non-Christian groups such as Catholics or other sects using Christianity are being killed too.

Read the report from Mike Ratliff about the Christians being persecuted:

Prayer Needed

 

ISIS Terrorists Preparing To Shoot Non-Sunni Child (not one of the christian children mentioned in above post, but it is exactly what they are doing in all areas ruled by the Islamic State right now).

David Platt’s Way of Salvation

David Platt’s Way Of Salvation

        For about 2 years, the Sinner’s Prayer has been called into question by certain evangelical leaders such as David Platt the new president of the Southern Baptist’s IMB (International Missions Board) who was elected into office this year. Around 2012 David Platt made a huge noise by his claim that the Sinner’s Prayer is superstitious and even causing a damnable offense. He claims “accepting Jesus into your heart is superstitious and unbiblical.” I tried going to Platt’s church before. I will explain my experience attending David Platt’s church and my experiences, but it must first be noted right off the bat that David Platt’s statements of faith are orthodox and biblical for the most part. He has firm stances about reformed theology such as the fact he is a Calvinist and in most cases promotes the gospel accurately and understands sin and hell and salvation through faith alone in Christ alone. But that being said…

David Platt is annoying and overrated

        I personally think Platt is being overly sensational and having an extreme overreaction to how most evangelicals believe in such ideas as the “Sinner’s Prayer” or that “accepting Jesus into your heart” are proper ways to evangelize. I believe this is a war about terms that are not truly defined or agreed upon by the majority of Christians. Terms that are said all of the time with various intentions behind them. It really depends on your intention of what you want to communicate in speaking with such terms. If you are an arminian of course you would mean, “It is up to you to choose God since you have the ability to prevent him from saving you,” and if you are a Calvinist, contrary to popular belief it is okay to say “accept Christ” if you simply mean, “Yes believe the truth since God is calling you to salvation and giving you the gift of repentance.” It is all semantics. Many people came to Christ who started with the Sinner’s Prayer.

        I also think David Platt is just trying to be controversial here to get attention for his cause. It kind of reminds me of how his book Radical was written (basically a white guy version of Francis Chan’s Crazy Love). He comes off as one of those judgmental social liberals (all though he is mainly theologically conservative and orthodox) that believe wealth is evil and we should give everything away and live poor and do social things. The way he promotes discipleship, and explains it in his book, it ends up being a legalistic form of Christianity which is ironic since the idea of his book talks about loving and accepting people. The idea of anti-legalism and loving everyone and accepting them becomes legalistic in the sense that Platt comes off as judging anyone who keeps a lot of money and does not give as much to missions etc. It is summed up as: Sell everything to be a REAL Christian and move to the ghetto to disciple the hood you rich white yuppies! Do it for Jesus! Or you can just go to a 3rd world country and become a missionary or at least give a lot of money to them.

        I am a 5 point Calvinist. So I hold to reformed theology when it comes to soteriology. But I do not think the Sinner’s Prayer is a mortal sin or something we should fight against. Is it biblical? Well there is no biblical mandate for it nor formula. But some people who came up with it base it off the the biblical idea that people should confess their sins and confess with their mouth the Lord Jesus. This idea is in Romans 10:9, while not a complete formula for a Sinner’s Prayer, the idea comes from it. Accepting Jesus is just the idea that people make a choice to follow God. When a person confesses with theor mouth the Lord Jesus and repents of their sins and asks for forgiveness they actually are confirming the truth of the gospel and making a conscious choice to worship God and become a Christian. Like it or not, the hyper-Calvinists and egg headed reformed theologians (who try way too hard to have perfect theology) really get alarmed when people start talking about humans making actual choices. We should not let this get in the way of evangelization. Yes, I do believe in the sovereignty of God and predestination that God has determined who is going to be saved etc. etc. But I am not going to go around telling old Child Evangelism Fellowship ladies they are promoting heresy over it or anything. But that is what seems to be the case now days with this New Gospel/New Calvinism nonsense.

Wow, totally radical! You know he is serious with this face! It’s what the Gospel demands!

Attending a Sunday at The Church at Brook Hills

        My experience at his mega-church about a year and a half ago, The Church at Brook Hills in Birmingham, Alabama has been less than satisfying. And yes, he pastors a mega-church. I tried to attend his church and see if it would fit with me since I could not find any other churches in town. When I showed up the parking lot was incredibly full and it was hard to find a parking spot. When I did I was a few minutes early and the first service was coming to an end. I walked through the main entrance into the lobby and like zombies staring at a light, everyone in the church lobby had their backs turned toward the entrance I walked in through. No one, not 1 person, was paying attention to the entrance or the exits or anything. Everyone was staring at the TV screen of David Platt preaching in the sanctuary. I thought to myself, how crazy. You would think security would be important. Anyone could show up with a gun and shoot everyone or have stolen people’s wallets or purses or just anything because no one was looking anywhere but facing away and looking up at big TV’s. No one was there to greet me or care I showed up. I had no clue what to do. There also was nowhere to sit as every chair or couch was taken over by people staring at the screens. I ended up sitting on the floor near a trash can. No one knew I was there either.

        Finally, the service ended and waves of people walked out of the sanctuary. I stood up and waited. Maybe 15 minutes later a random guy walked up to me because I happened to be standing next to a “small groups posting” at a table. There were small tables with info on small groups. This guy just wanted to say hi which at first I thought was nice. After awhile of small talk, I then began to ask him serious questions about theology and what the church believes. The guy could not answer me and when I asked him about Calvinism or if Platt is premillenial or amillenial the guy acted as if that is a wrong question to ask and hesitated to actually answer me. It was as if they were judgmental questions a person should not care about. After that, the guy told me about small groups and how I should join one. He referred me to the front desk, the people who had their backs turned when I walked in. After he did that he pretty much acted as if his job was done and he had no more reason to talk to me and then walked away and also ignored me from that point on. Such people are told to be disciplers yet they figure they just have to go through the motions and then they are done, and their life becomes easy once again. I find this a real problem with such churches. It is a joke to me. After that I got the list from a lady at the front desk, or the how to find a small group paper. It was very unhelpful and contained nothing I did not already see on a sign. I come from a traditional church background where Sunday School is an actual thing.

        Unfortunately, with these “disciplers” and their trendy ideas of new hip ways of “doing church” Sunday School has been abandoned and instead of people bringing you into the fold and showing you around they leave it up to you and ignore you and just give you info on how to contact people. Basically, the new person has to go out of his way to find a small group, email the person or call them and ask if they can join and where it is located and how to get there. It is really inconvenient and I believe it will prohibited many new church people from going through all that humiliating hard work to find fellowship. It is like being the new kid in school where it is really awkward and intimidating, especially if you are a shy person. You wonder if people will like you or not since it is their territory. So showing up to church hoping to meet people and maybe attend a Sunday School class was pointless since no one would allow me to go to any small group unless I register first, nor were any of them even meeting at the church except one. So basically, no one meets for bible studies or anything at the church really. They are all off in different areas of the city like coffee shops (oh great now I have to spend $4.98 plus tax on a latte) or someone’s home. The places where the small groups meet are all rich areas or trendy expensive cafes. This has got to turn away most people from low income families. Birmingham has tons of low income families. There is not a lot of diversity in this church either. Not that I believe in forced or affirmative action type of church membership. I just know that there is no way most black families are going to feel welcome at this church. I used to substitute teach in the public schools in the inner-cities for over 2 years and have had plenty of exposure to black culture. And if everyone has to meet at a coffee shop or trendy cafe it means you most likely will feel obligated to buy something. Who can afford fellowship if you have to spend money just to meet? Old  style traditional church and its free coffee during Sunday school has a purpose!

        I ended up going to the church service after learning about their small groups. Church was typical trendy “worship” music with guitars and other typical hipster Christianity style music going on. Everyone was casual, Pastor Platt had his Vans on and jeans, just a cool polo shirt and jeans with Vans pastor. If you dressed up to go to church at this place you would feel incredibly out of place. I did not see many old people either. It is a very young church with people in their 20’s-early 40’s. There really is no point in actually showing up for church either when you can watch it online and just go to your small group later, since there is no fellowship to be expected when you actually go to the mega-church building for church service. I just don’t get it.

I am wondering if his small group leaders read this or if they did they acted exactly how the book explains it…Hmmm…

        A few days later I decided to email a small group. I looked into a few, and I was hoping to go to a coed group because I am single and want to meet women as well as other Christian brothers. I don’t think it is necessarily wrong to go to church to pick up hot Christian women (after all, where else can I find a godly wife? Eharmony? Yeah right…) There was no mixed group near me so I decided to just email an all guys small group instead and suck it up and meet a bunch of Christian brothers. Or so I hoped. I told them who I was and how I would like to have fellowship and meet up. Unfortunately, the leader of the group told me I could not join because they are a group of guys who have been together for awhile and want to keep their group small so they are not accepting new people right now. The guy then said “thanks for your interest and hope you find your fellowship!” Oh yay! He cares about me! Needless to say, I felt like crap and humiliated. Like I am some loser not allowed to hang out with the cool Christians. I’m just a dorky Christian no one cares about and no one wants to know. Why were they even written down on the list of available small groups if they were refusing new guys from joining? For a large church most of their small groups were too far away from me in the city. This is why Sunday School or Bible studies at the actual church building make more sense. It is easy to find and get to. It is a huge building, so why could they not do this? Why was I rejected? They don’t know my story or my needs or my spiritual battles or how I feel inside. They just reject me without guilt. I reported my search results in an email to the small group director girl. When i told he what happened she said sorry and was offering me other groups, or telling me to keep searching. I said no thanks and told her how it made me feel rejected and I don’t feel comfortable going to their church anymore. She didn’t really say much then. So much for David Platt’s discipleship at his church! It sure didn’t work for me. If discipleship is the true way for a Christian to express his spirituality it sure is not working at his church.

Bill O’Reilly Supports Transcendental Meditation

Bill O’Reilly Supports Transcendental Meditation

        I just got done watching the O’Reilly Factor on Fox News. At the very end of the show Bill talked about how he ran into Paul McCartney of the Beatles at some function. Bill said McCartney recently held a fundraiser concert to raise money for the David Lynch Foundation that teaches transcendental meditation to children as young as 4 years old. Bill O’Reilly then stated his support for the David Lynch Foundation, and said that TM helps these young kids, some of them suffering with extreme anger who have been abused. Bill O’Reilly said “transcendental meditation helps these kids.” And then he thanked Paul McCartney for supporting the David Lynch Foundation. Bill O’Reilly is a Roman Catholic and he sees nothing wrong with TM. This speaks volumes about how Catholics are so susceptible to the New Age within their mystical practices as well as undiscerning conservatives who have no sense of true biblical faith, but are only politically conservative. Bill O’Reilly is seen by millions of people every night as one of the top rated news and politics shows on TV. He is very influential and has authored several history books such as Killing Lincoln, Killing Kennedy, Killing Jesus, Killing Patton, and others. He sees absolutely nothing wrong with TM or what David Lynch promotes and fully supports it and thinks it is a wonderful thing for children. 

 

        David Lynch is a visual artist, musician, film and television director, author and sometimes actor. he is known for surrealist films. He heavily supports TM after being influenced by the Maharishi when he met him in the 1970’s. Maharishi is the founder of the TM movement. Paul McCartney and the Beatles went over to India and learned Hindu teachings and TM and brought it back to the west to influence many young people. Many young Christians think old bands like The Beatles are cool and hip. Those people professing Christianity who practice the Spiritual Formation and Contemplative Prayer practices brought about by Roman Catholicism are susceptible to having a desire to practice TM on top the Christian mysticism they already practice and will possibly include it.  

On the David Lynch Foundation website it talks about how TM will bring peace to the world. There are children’s testimonies expressing how TM has helped their lives significantly. Kids growing up in poverty, high urban crime and other unfortunate situations are being taught TM. This is one way that Satan is using to influence children into New Age thought and beliefs and opening them up to the spirit world at a very young age. It is unfortunate. But more and more New Age, mystical, occult and magical practices that open people up to demons and Satan’s influence will be popular and such “world peace” ideas will no place for Christianity. Jesus warned that the end of days will have such deception.

The Beatles in the 1970’s with Maharishi Yogi (the founder of the TM movement) in the middle.

*Update, Bill O’Reilly the next night on his show, during his mail segment read a letter from a fan that praised O’Reilly for mentioning the David Lynch Foundation. The person said they have a child who lives in Newtown (same town as the Newtown Massacre of 21 children) and has been taught TM. They thanked O’Reilly for his support of TM and the David Lynch Foundation and said TM has helped their child cope with the trauma of what happened in their town. Bill then said more praises for David Lynch and TM and how it helps people.